Zir0's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Astro Chaser]

A Few Things to Clean up

Hey.

Just a few issues:

- Your HUD is way too busy. Find a way to reduce the clutter by not showing so many numbers. Use little icons or graphics where you can.

- You're going retro with your main menu selection (using arrow keys and enter). That's fine, but in the submenus, you switch to mouse. Keep it consistent.

- When adjusting music volume, the bar moves and follows the x axis of my mouse, even without dragging it, not sure if that's by design or not, but you should just use standard controlling here. Of course, this note only applies if you allowed the player to use the mouse to navigate all the menus.

- Also, the music volume changes can't be previewed. Since the music is already playing, why not allow the changes to be previewed? The changes aren't acknowledged until the game actually starts.

- If I completely mute the music, then I get killed, the music starts up again...

- Is there a way to adjust options while in-game?

Graphics, control, and audio quality are fine.

__________________
- Ziro out.

Calipe responds:

Thanks for your very helpful suggestions. I will definitely look into implementing them. It is with reviews like yours that we developers grow our skills.
Cheers!

[Google Search]

Initialization Failed

Hey.

When the Flash starts, it keeps showing the following message:

"Initialization failed: please check the API key,
swf location, version and network availability."

Reloaded a few times, cleared cache; still to no avail.

Using Flash 10.

_________________
- Ziro out.

LimsUniverses responds:

Sorry it was the wrong version!

[Knife Party!]

Too Linear

Hey.

Basically, it's just a slugfest of button mashings to the death.

Also, the music didn't seem to fit, and the knife sound is monotonous and gets annoying quickly. It's lacking sounds, as that was really the only sound I noticed.

This game is probably best suited for 2 players, because the AI behaviors remind me of the same lowball tactics used by AI from games from certain other versus fighter games.

Repetitive and quite annoying.

The artwork is pretty good, however.

______________
- Ziro out.

SeethingSwarm responds:

The mucic and art is supposed to be in contrast to the rest of the game, but whatever. It is meant to be a hard game :)

[AS3 Button Game Tutorial]

More User Friendly

Hey.

If you're making a beginner's tutorial, then it would be a big help to show screen shots as you go through the steps (a picture is worth a thousand words (-: ). It looks like you're walking the beginner through using the Flash editor.

Start off with an introduction by actually telling the beginner about the button, and what it will do, instead of just saying "Final Product".

There are several typos in the tutorial as well.

Also, tell the beginner which software you are using. Include what software you're using (CS3, CS4, etc.). Also, include any prerequisite knowledge that may apply to your tutorial.

_________________
- Zir0 out.

billowillo responds:

thanks for the feedback, in the next installment ill be sure to add some pictures, there are typos? i thought i got them all...

[Off Your Trolley]

Needs More Gameplay

Hey.

This is similar to a mouse-avoider type game, except you're using the keyboard, and can only move horizontally.

You have the basic time power-up, but the instant level exit is good because it's rather uncommon (I think).

The game needs something to mix it up a bit: Some suggestions:

- An icon that changes the icon you need to collect. For example, say you need to collect the blue-colored icons, then you collect this power up, it will change the required to a different icon of random type. A different idea is when this icon is collected, the required icon will change to the NEXT icon that the player picks up. ;-)

- An icon that changes the speed of your cart. This could be power-up and power-down icons, that last for a short amount of time.

Good skill with your game.

___________________
- Zir0 out.

willcheng responds:

Thanks for all the suggestions and the detailed review.

[Easter Eggs Tycoon]

Nice Game

Hey.

Interesting concept of gameplay here. (-:

Gameplay
- The color-matching, in my opinion, is the selling point. As a programmer myself, all my "training" of hue, RBG, and what not is finally being tested. :-P

- Can you save your progress in this game?

Audio
- You implemented a 2D sound system! You actually used panning and volume controls! Awesome! :-D
- The quality of the sounds available is good.

Graphics
- Done quite nicely, and the animation was very smooth.

Polish/Other
- It still seems a bit limited in the selection of sounds available. The game's a little too quiet. Perhaps add some more sounds, maybe some ambient background sounds, and perhaps the machinery could make more sounds. When more clients appear, maybe there's a little bell they can ring, if they're not visible when they appear (for example, if you're tending to your hen). Perhaps the clients could make subtle sounds, depending on their moods.

- Perhaps you could include some scoring information as to how scoring is made, due to accuracy of the color-matching? (-: As this is not required, some details fanatics (like me) could check that out.

Overall, very nice game.

As you were, soldier.

* salutes *
___________________
- Ziro out.

D-mah responds:

I was in a hurry to release it before Easter, so it didn't come out as neat as I would like it to be. If I decide to make a new version, I'll take your suggestions into the account. Thanks.

PS: adding the scoring info into the author's comment.

[newgrounds FAQ/help]

Thanks for the Info

Hey.

While most of this can easily be researched on NG, I do have a question about voting power: would you happen to know where I could find the actual formula? I know it uses your experience, then you get additional % based of your B/P, but what is the exact formula? Probably not even available to us.

Thanks for making this. Nice tune, by the way. ;-)

__________________
- Ziro out.

cantstophammertime responds:

voting power 5/ BP rank +30%

results a formula:

5:100x30=1,5-> 1,5+5= 6.5 voting power

hope this could help

[Hit That Poring!]

Booooooooring.

Hey.

- All I did was go back and forth, simply holding the spacebar down the entire time. Not much to it. Needs something that actually requires some skill. Make it into a full-fledged platform 8-directional scrolling game where you can get power-ups, and go around bashing various different things.

- Needs more content.

- Add sound effects.

- You bash the, then more of them appear than you bashed, and eventually, it's overrun with them.

- The best thing about this game was its music quality, although the music didn't fit the game.

- Please go back to the drawing board and try again.

Good skill in the future.

______________________
-Ziro out.

badtrip712 responds:

yep totally agree with you! I'll put my new artist to work. And we'll be working on a new game...

[Hell yeah, bikes. YEAH!]

Needs Much Improvement

Hey.

- The background is distracting and makes it difficult to see things.

- Is there scoring in the game?

- Make the crosshairs stand out more. They are difficult to see, no matter which set they are changed to.

- Make a mare pratical challenge. The targets that are "teleporting" all over the place are annoying, then the screen just gets overrun with them, which brings me to the next point:

- The instant and sudden transition to the Game Over screen. Make a special effect transition. Not very user-friendly.

- The instructions were a little hard to read. Make them stand out more.

- Include more sound effects. And if you do (you really _should_), include at least two similar sounds for some of the events, because I can already tell you that based on what I've seen here, you'd put the same annoying, monotonous sound effect in.

- Please put in some (more) effort, because this looks like it was thrown together in a very short period of time.

Good skill in the future.

_________________
- Ziro out.

shadow-ghost responds:

I really appreciate the feedback, but I think the part you were missing was that it wasn't supposed to be taken seriously. I guess I didn't make that obvious enough, though ;)

Anyway, have fun, and good luck with... whatever you need luck with.

-SG